Now is the time for President Obama, finally, to respond to all the official requests for Pollard’s release by commuting his sentence to time served.

The newly declassified 1987 CIA damage assessment bolsters official calls for
the immediate release of Jonathan Pollard. While portions of the CIA document
remain redacted, the disclosures officially confirm that Pollard spied for
Israel, not against the United States.

Moreover, the document puts the
lie to American allegations that have been used for over a quarter of a century
to justify Pollard’s continued incarceration. For example, Pollard’s full
cooperation with the prosecution was one of the welcome admissions in this
document, as was the confirmation that the volume of information Pollard
transferred to Israel was far less than claimed.

The CIA document also
reveals the subterfuge used by the US government to breach its plea agreement
with Pollard.

The report brazenly states that Pollard was jailed for life
because of an “unauthorized” interview he gave to The Jerusalem Post. This is
preposterous. No reporter, much less one carrying a camera and a tape recorder,
could possibly gain access to a prisoner in a US federal prison without
authorization.

Another canard used to justify Pollard’s life sentence is
the claim that he did enormous damage to US national security. While the
declassified CIA document does not deal with the damage done by Pollard, this
issue is fully addressed in a concurrent damage assessment known as The Victim
Impact Statement (VIS), written by the US Department of Justice.

The VIS,
now a matter of public record, was submitted to the sentencing judge in 1987 as
an aid in determining Pollard’s sentence. After a few introductory sentences
about the “scope and breadth” of Pollard’s disclosures to Israel, the VIS
describes the actual damage to the US as follows: “Mr. Pollard’s unauthorized
disclosures have threatened the US [sic] relations with numerous Middle East
Arab allies, many of whom question the extent to which Mr. Pollard’s disclosures
of classified information have skewed the balance of power in the Middle East.
Moreover, because Mr. Pollard provided the Israelis virtually any classified
document requested by Mr. Pollard’s coconspirators, the US has been deprived of
the quid pro quo routinely received during authorized and official intelligence
exchanges with Israel, and Israel has received information classified at a level
far in excess of that ever contemplated by the National Security Council. The
obvious result of Mr. Pollard’s largesse is that US bargaining leverage with the
Israeli government in any further intelligence exchanges has been undermined. In
short, Mr. Pollard’s activities have adversely affected US relations with both
its Middle East Arab allies and the Government of Israel.”

The US
government’s own words in the VIS, carefully scripted to present the most
compelling case for the harshest possible sentence, reflect the damage as being
nothing more than short-term friction between the US and unnamed Arab countries
and a temporary reduction in bargaining leverage held by the US over Israel. Not
the kind of permanent, irreversible, and overwhelming harm to US national
security that some have claimed.

Pollard has repeatedly expressed remorse
and was not charged with intent to harm the US. He is the only person in
American history to receive a life sentence for spying for an ally. His
continued incarceration is jarringly inconsistent with American claims of close
friendship and security cooperation with Israel.

The US administration
has repeatedly demonstrated remarkable flexibility towards other allies,
downgrading charges and dealing leniently with spies from China, the
Philippines, Greece and Saudi Arabia, among others. No such consideration has
been extended to Israel in Pollard’s case, despite overwhelming evidence that he
is being punished far beyond the severity of the offense he
committed.

Many senior US officials, including those with firsthand
knowledge of the classified file, are openly calling for Pollard’s release. They
say his sentence is “grossly disproportionate” and that keeping him in prison is
“a travesty of justice.”

Both the prime minister and president of Israel
have issued official requests for the Israeli agent’s release on humanitarian
grounds because his health is failing. He has served 28 years in prison, seven
of them in solitary confinement.

The newly declassified CIA damage
assessment has again focused public attention on the injustice of keeping
Pollard in prison. Now is the time for President Barack Obama, finally, to
respond to all the official requests for Pollard’s release by commuting his
sentence to time served. There are no more excuses. It is time to send Pollard
home.

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